יום שישי, 17 באוגוסט 2012

Israeli Torture Witness Jailed on Trumped-Up Charges

STOUGHTON, WI – August 16, 2012.An Israeli magistrate court in Haifa extended the detention of Guy Shamir who has been held without bail since last Friday.The complaint against him alleges that he threatened the children of Esperanza Alon, a family court judge in Haifa. Each day this

week the police extended his detention for an additional 24 hours. Concurrently the state prosecutor’s office announced its intent to indict.Now the prosecution is asking to keep Shamir in jail without bail until the end of the trial.

According to the complaint, the incident arose during a telephone conversation between Alon’s secretary and Shamir on August 6th – four days before Shamir’s arrest.The indictment states that Alon’s secretary called Shamir directly instead of contacting his attorney to make sure that Shamir would clearly receive the judge's ruling against him on the custody of his children. Shamir allegedly said in response, "I don’t care about the judge’s ruling.Tell her to mind her own children . . . ." At that point the secretary hung up the phone before Shamir could finish his response.

Attorney Raz Misgav, who was appointed yesterday to represent Shamir, points out that the complaint which the police filed against Shamir is only made by the judge’s secretary. Alon herself did not make a complaint against him at all.Furthermore, the 4-day wait to arrest Shamir is not consistent with seriousness of the allegation - as if the charges were in fact trumped-up.

"I tell you, I saw a lot of wacky claims in my life,” said Misgav. “This claim is the most surreal thing that I have seen so far. He never threatened anyone. The call was cut short by the secretary. Moreover, I certainly will recommend my client to submit a counterclaim against the police and state prosecutor with the Appellate Court.They arrested him, imprison him without bail and prosecute him over this?It is something completely unrealistic which I have never seen in my career.”

"It is important to note that my client signed affidavits as a witness for lawsuits pending in the United States.These lawsuits allege the Israeli judicial system hunts down divorced fathers exactly as they are doing to my client right now."

On July 12th police raided the home of David Weisskopf, a plaintiff in one of the lawsuits.They confiscated his documents related to his lawsuit against Israeli officials alleging he and other divorced fathers are torture victims.The police confiscated several documents including witness affidavits and reference to another lawsuit pending in New Jersey against the same Israeli officials.Since then, they have been using those confiscated documents to harass plaintiffs and witnesses in these lawsuits.According to an injunction requested today in the New Jersey lawsuit, the Israeli officials are even trying to bully a rabbi into allowing that plaintiff’s body to be desecrated “after his death”.Now Guy Shamir, a divorced father of two, is the latest victimized विटनेस.

“They are using our children as pawns to attack us,” says Weisskopf.“In Shamir’s case they are retaliating by trying to sever all contact between him and his children.I know Guy; he is one of the most loving & gentle fathers I have ever met.Their extreme tactics will only galvanize us in our fight for our children’s basic human rights.”

Social Justice activists have announced they will continue protesting against the arrest of Guy Shamir.They hope that by raising public awareness the government will take notice and clean up corruption that currently permeates the Israeli judicial and welfare systems.